See text Lanternfish (or myctophids, from the Greek μυκτήρ myktḗr, "nose" and ophis, "serpent") are small mesopelagic fish of the large family Myctophidae.

Their sister family, the Neoscopelidae, are much fewer in number but superficially very similar; at least one neoscopelid shares the common name "lanternfish": the large-scaled lantern fish, Neoscopelus macrolepidotus.

In all but one species, Taaningichthys paurolychnus, a number of photophores (light-producing organs) are present; these are paired and concentrated in ventrolateral rows on the body and head.

Some may also possess specialised photophores on the caudal peduncle, in proximity to the eyes (e.g., the "headlights" of Diaphus species), and luminous patches at the base of the fins.

After a night spent feeding in the surface layers of the water column, the lanternfish begin to descend back into the lightless depths and are gone by daybreak.

[6] A major source of food for many marine animals, lanternfish are an important link in the food chain of many local ecosystems, being heavily preyed upon by whales and dolphins, large pelagic fish such as salmon, tuna and sharks, grenadiers and other deep-sea fish (including other lanternfish), pinnipeds, sea birds, notably penguins, and large squid such as the jumbo squid, Dosidicus gigas.

During their early evolutionary history, lanternfish were likely not adapted to a high oceanic lifestyle but occurred over shelf and upper-slope regions, where they were locally abundant during the middle Eocene.

This transition is interpreted to be related to the change from a halothermal deep-ocean circulation to a thermohaline regime and the associated cooling of the deep ocean and rearrangement of nutrient and silica supply.

The warmer late Oligocene to early middle Miocene period was characterised by an increase in the disparity of lanternfish but with a reduction in their otolith sizes.

A second and persisting secular pulse in lanternfish diversity (particularly within the genus Diaphus) and increase in size begins with the "biogenic bloom" during the late Miocene, paralleled with diatom abundance and gigantism in baleen whales.

[2] Benthosema Bolinichthys Centrobranchus Ceratoscopelus Ctenoscopelus Dasyscopelus Diaphus Diogenichthys Electrona Gonichthys Gymnoscopelus Hintonia Hygophum Idiolychnus Krefftichthys Lampadena Lampanyctodes Lampanyctus Lampichthys Lepidophanes Lobianchia Loweina Metelectrona Myctophum Nannobrachium Notolychnus Notoscopelus Parvilux Protomyctophum Scopelopsis Stenobrachius Symbolophorus Taaningichthys Tarletonbeania Triphoturus The following fossil genera are also known: